‘Oh, I don’t know what this means’ cried Ivan Fedoro-vitch, transported with indignation.
‘Leave off, Colia,’ begged the prince. Exclamations arose
on all sides.
‘Let him go on reading at all costs!’ ordered Lizabetha Prokofievna, evidently preserving her composure by a des-perate effort. ‘Prince, if the reading is stopped, you and I will quarrel.’
Colia had no choice but to obey. With crimson cheeks he read on unsteadily:
‘But while our young millionaire dwelt as it were in the Empyrean, something new occurred. One fine morning a man called upon him, calm and severe of aspect, distin-guished, but plainly dressed. Politely, but in dignified terms, as befitted his errand, he briefly explained the motive for his visit. He was a lawyer of enlightened views; his client was a young man who had consulted him in confidence. This young man was no other than the son of P—, though he bears another name. In his youth P—, the sensualist, had seduced a young girl, poor but respectable. She was a serf, but had received a European education. Finding that a child was expected, he hastened her marriage with a man of noble character who had loved her for a long time. He helped the young couple for a time, but he was soon obliged to give up, for the high-minded husband refused to accept anything from him. Soon the careless nobleman forgot all about his former mistress and the child she had borne him; then, as we know, he died intestate. P— ‘s son, born after his mother’s marriage, found a true father in the generous man whose name he bore. But when he also died, the orphan was left to provide for himself, his mother now being an invalid who had lost the use of her limbs. Leaving her in a distant
province, he came to the capital in search of pupils. By dint of daily toil he earned enough to enable him to follow the college courses, and at last to enter the university. But what can one earn by teaching the children of Russian merchants at ten copecks a lesson, especially with an invalid mother to keep? Even her death did not much diminish the hardships of the young man’s struggle for existence. Now this is the question: how, in the name of justice, should our scion have argued the case? Our readers will think, no doubt, that he would say to himself: ‘P— showered benefits upon me all my life; he spent tens of thousands of roubles to educate me, to provide me with governesses, and to keep me un-der treatment in Switzerland. Now I am a millionaire, and P—‘s son, a noble young man who is not responsible for the faults of his careless and forgetful father, is wearing himself out giving ill-paid lessons. According to justice, all that was done for me ought to have been done for him. The enor-mous sums spent upon me were not really mine; they came to me by an error of blind Fortune, when they ought to have gone to P—‘s son. They should have gone to benefit him, not me, in whom P— interested himself by a mere caprice, in-stead of doing his duty as a father. If I wished to behave nobly, justly, and with delicacy, I ought to bestow half my fortune upon the son of my benefactor; but as economy is my favourite virtue, and I know this is not a case in which the law can intervene, I will not give up half my millions. But it would be too openly vile, too flagrantly infamous, if I did not at least restore to P—‘s son the tens of thousands of roubles spent in curing my idiocy. This is simply a case
of conscience and of strict justice. Whatever would have be-come of me if P— had not looked after my education, and had taken care of his own son instead of me?’
‘No, gentlemen, our scions of the nobility do not reason thus. The lawyer, who had taken up the matter purely out of friendship to the young man, and almost against his will, invoked every consideration of justice, delicacy, honour, and even plain figures; in vain, the ex-patient of the Swiss lunatic asylum was inflexible. All this might pass, but the sequel is absolutely unpardonable, and not to be excused by any interesting malady. This millionaire, having but just discarded the old gaiters of his professor, could not even understand that the noble young man slaving away at his lessons was not asking for charitable help, but for his right-ful due, though the debt was not a legal one; that, correctly speaking, he was not asking for anything, but it was merely his friends who had thought fit to bestir themselves on his behalf. With the cool insolence of a bloated capitalist, se-cure in his millions, he majestically drew a banknote for fifty roubles from his pocket-book and sent it to the noble young man as a humiliating piece of charity. You can hardly believe it, gentlemen! You are scandalized and disgusted; you cry out in indignation! But that is what he did! Needless to say, the money was returned, or rather flung back in his face. The case is not within the province of the law, it must be referred to the tribunal of public opinion; this is what we now do, guaranteeing the truth of all the details which we have related.’
When Colia had finished reading, he handed the paper to
the prince, and retired silently to a corner of the room, hid-ing his face in his hands. He was overcome by a feeling of inexpressible shame; his boyish sensitiveness was wounded beyond endurance. It seemed to him that something ex-traordinary, some sudden catastrophe had occurred, and that he was almost the cause of it, because he had read the article aloud.
Yet all the others were similarly affected. The girls were uncomfortable and ashamed. Lizabetha Prokofievna re-strained her violent anger by a great effort; perhaps she bitterly regretted her interference in the matter; for the pres-ent she kept silence. The prince felt as very shy people often do in such a case; he was so ashamed of the conduct of other people, so humiliated for his guests, that he dared not look them in the face. Ptitsin, Varia, Gania, and Lebedeff him-self, all looked rather confused. Stranger still, Hippolyte and the ‘son of Pavlicheff’ also seemed slightly surprised, and Lebedeff’s nephew was obviously far from pleased. The boxer alone was perfectly calm; he twisted his moustaches with affected dignity, and if his eyes were cast down it was certainly not in confusion, but rather in noble modesty, as if he did not wish to be insolent in his triumph. It was evident that he was delighted with the article.
‘The devil knows what it means,’ growled Ivan Fedoro-vitch, under his breath; ‘it must have taken the united wits of fifty footmen to write it.’
‘May I ask your reason for such an insulting supposition, sir?’ said Hippolyte, trembling with rage.
You will admit yourself, general, that for an honourable
man, if the author is an honourable man, that is an—an in-sult,’ growled the boxer suddenly, with convulsive jerkings of his shoulders.
‘In the first place, it is not for you to address me as ‘sir,’ and, in the second place, I refuse to give you any explana-tion,’ said Ivan Fedorovitch vehemently; and he rose without another word, and went and stood on the first step of the flight that led from the verandah to the street, turning his back on the company. He was indignant with Lizabetha Prokofievna, who did not think of moving even now.
‘Gentlemen, gentlemen, let me speak at last,’ cried the prince, anxious and agitated. ‘Please let us understand one another. I say nothing about the article, gentlemen, except that every word is false; I say this because you know it as well as I do. It is shameful. I should be surprised if any one of you could have written it.’
‘I did not know of its existence till this moment,’ declared Hippolyte. ‘I do not approve of it.’
‘I knew it had been written, but I would not have advised its publication,’ said Lebedeff’s nephew, ‘because it is pre-mature.’
‘I knew it, but I have a right. I…
